Judith had returned home from her debrief session with Constance and then headed off, straight away, for a long walk on the Heath. In the grounds of Kenwood House she’d stopped to rest on a bench. Ten years previously she’d been here with Martin, at a concert of choral classics. They’d sat on a blanket on the grass and watched a firework display, synchronised with Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance Number 1. It had been uplifting, rousing, soul enriching. Perhaps not everything she had done with Martin had been forced and miserable, after all. On the way home, as she passed by Hampstead Heath station, she’d checked out the Evening Standard; Nick’s case hadn’t made it onto the front page yet, but this may not be the last edition.
Back home, when she came into the living room, Greg removed his headset. ‘I heard the news about your client,’ he said. ‘They said he’d changed his plea to guilty to poisoning and the CPS was going to accept it.’ He waited for a response from Judith. Of course, the online press would always be one step ahead of the print version.
‘You’re better informed than me, then,’ she said.
‘So you were right to get me to check those names – his sister, his nephew.’
‘I wasn’t right about anything. I got things totally and utterly wrong,’ Judith said, with a gasp of exhaustion, sitting down and pulling off her shoes one after the other. ‘I insisted the panellists were suspects, but I never really listened to any of them, what they were saying – Brett ate the sandwiches, Brett felt unwell, Brett had a shellfish allergy, Brett developed a rash, Nick was jumpy, didn’t label things, filled up Brett’s glass with water, tried to hide the evidence. They all told the story of what happened, but I didn’t listen – not till the very end, when the damage was already done.’
‘To be fair, the other panellists were all colourful characters.’
Judith had a sudden urge to shout at Greg, to tell him that he’d been the one who’d distracted her in the first place, with his theories about ritual slaughter and junk food, but she knew she had already been going down that road when he’d offered to help, that she had been more than content to spread the net wide. She ran her fingers through her hair.
‘And the last clue – oh I didn’t even tell Connie this one. I couldn’t destroy the last vestiges of her faith in human nature, not so early on in her career. She feels sorry for Nick. When Brett went down, face first, Adrian said he tried to turn him onto his back, but Brett resisted him. Zoe said Brett’s arms were flailing around. Even Adrian said he noticed Nick – that during Brett’s introduction, Nick stood in the central aisle, towards the back of the hall. But once Brett collapsed, Nick came forward, right to the front. To watch.’
‘You think he was gloating?’
Judith hesitated. ‘No,’ she said eventually. ‘Even my twisted mind won’t allow me to believe that of Nick. But he could have said something then. And I should have worked it all out earlier. It was there in Zoe’s video – Nick at the front, on the edge of the screen. When Brett threw his head back, it must have been to stare directly at Nick, his assailant. Brett’s arms? He must have been trying to point to Nick. That’s why he struggled against Adrian so hard. He was trying to tell them it was Nick. And they spun him around and Nick ran off, and the opportunity was lost.’
‘Brett tried again, though, didn’t he? He tried to say something, even though, like you said, no one could understand him.’
‘I understand him now. George. That’s what he tried to say. The name of the boy who died was George. How ironic. You see Nick said in court that if Brett had acknowledged him, had showed him he remembered the boy, even in some small way, he would never have hurt him. Of course, that may all be justification after the event, but I’m not certain. So there we are. Brett did try to tell him he remembered, after all. It was just all too late by then.’
‘What will happen to Nick?’
‘If they’ve accepted his plea, like you said – although I’m surprised they’re not pushing for a murder conviction – then they’ll adjourn for sentencing. Connie will do what she can in mitigation, if he allows her, but the prosecution will use words like “premeditated” and “revenge” – you can imagine. Andy will love it. Either way he’ll go to prison. It’s just a question of how long a sentence.’
‘That’s sad.’
‘Not you too. I got the same sob story claptrap from Connie. It’s sad that the boy died and the mother has no son. But you can’t go running around poisoning people. I should have known. I was trying to be so clever with the pathologist, belittling his experience, making fun of him for his diagnosis, tearing it apart. And he was right all along. Even without the stomach contents, he’d discovered it, how Nick’d done it. I was so blinkered. I…disrespected him, another professional.’
‘That’s your job.’
‘It’s my job to defend my client, but not to the extent that I make everyone else look stupid or, worse than that, I’m so narrow-minded, so arrogant that I genuinely believe that everyone else is stupid and I’m the only one with the answers. The saviour of the world and all the little people in it.’
‘I think you’re tired and you need to rest.’
‘Oh, but then I forgot the best bit.’
‘What’s that?’
‘I even got the Ambrosia project wrong.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘It wasn’t just about regulating junk food, like in the meeting minutes you found, or labelling meat. Ambrosia was all about gene-edited food and whether we should eat it, and the Sumners are growing it.’
‘So I was right then,’ Greg’s face lit up. ‘Mark Sumner was the one with the most to lose.’
Judith opened her mouth and then closed it again. Then she shuffled over towards the window and closed the curtain, even though it was brilliant sunshine outside. ‘I think I might just go straight to bed,’ she said. ‘It’s been quite a week.’
‘I’ll run you a bath?’
‘No…thank you. I…don’t need anything else from you, just now.’
Judith’s hands trembled, as she removed her jacket. Greg stepped forward to help her and she pushed him away.
‘Is there something else wrong?’ Greg said, as Judith stood with her back to him. ‘I mean…something wrong with us?’
‘I’m not sure. Should there be?’
‘I have this feeling, like before last time you…asked me to leave, without giving me any reason. I’m telling myself that I’m being stupid, that it’s just all the other stuff you’ve mentioned. God knows that’s enough reason for you to be upset. But I have to ask. Are you going to wake up tomorrow morning and tell me to go, again?’
Judith didn’t turn around. ‘I honestly don’t know,’ she said.
Greg sighed. ‘This is about Andy Chambers, isn’t it? What he said. I can explain, if you’ll let me.’
‘Andy Chambers – quite the chatterbox, when he wants to be.’
Greg’s hands went to his mouth. He reached out towards Judith again, but then retreated.
‘You’re entitled to do whatever you want in your business affairs. It’s nothing to do with me,’ she said, her voice brittle and low.
‘Don’t be like that. Look. Graham Hendricks and I go back a long way, to high school. Court TV was his baby. He had to be out of town for a few days, just after the launch and he called me, out of the blue, asked me to keep an eye on things for him. I was there less than a week, providing input on content mostly. I could’ve said no, but I’d like to think that I did a good job managing the show for a couple of days, kept things running smoothly and on the right side of the law and common sense. If I’d said no, he’d’ve asked someone else, and things might have become really tough for you.’
‘As opposed to the total media circus that prevailed.’
‘That’s not fair.’
‘Isn’t it? You sacrificed yourself then, for the common good. How noble.’
‘I helped a friend out and, at the same time, I was looking after your interests.’
‘You can’t possibly have thought that I would have been happy for you to do that job.’
‘You’re right, but I thought hard about it and, like I said, I believed it was the best option. Then, during Debbie Mallard’s case, with all the media attention and the pressure, if I’d told you, you would have been livid. Now, now it’s in the past and you saw that the Court TV coverage was balanced. Now, I’m hoping that you’ll give me a fair hearing.’
‘You were always going to tell me?’
‘At some stage, yes. I was waiting for the right moment.’
Judith heard the words Greg was speaking and they filled her with dread and disappointment. She could just about accept that his description of the work he undertook for Court TV was accurate, that he’d striven to be fair with the coverage and commentary which accompanied Debbie Mallard’s trial. And she knew Greg hated to let anyone down, so it rang true that he had agreed to help out his friend, without necessarily thinking through the consequences. But if Andy had not alerted her, she did not believe for one moment that Greg would have volunteered anything about his involvement.
‘Look,’ she said. ‘Maybe I made a mistake. We should never have tried this – tried again.’
‘Oh no! I’m not going to let you do this, not a second time.’
‘If I think our relationship isn’t working, I’m perfectly entitled to say.’ Now Judith had turned around and she had thrown her shoulders back.
‘And I’m perfectly entitled to disagree with you,’ Greg said. ‘Our relationship is just fine. And that’s a problem for you. It’s more than fine. It’s good. It’s great, and that scares you, doesn’t it?’
‘I’m so tired, Greg.’
‘Last time, I let you push me away. I respected your wishes even though I didn’t have a clue what I’d done wrong. This time, you need to tell me. If you want me to leave, to back off, you have to tell me what’s going on. Because I love you and I want to be with you now and always and I’m not going quietly this time.’
Judith sidestepped him, went into the kitchen, poured herself a glass of wine and then returned and sat down on the sofa. Greg perched on the arm, next to her.
‘There was a day, in the summer; you won’t remember,’ she began, eventually. ‘We sat on a park bench and this mother went past with her kids and you waved at one of them – the boy, I think.’
‘OK?’
‘I watched you. You smiled at him and your face lit up. More than that, something inside you came to life. A strange child, a stranger’s child, and you reached out to him like that. If he had tripped, you would have leaped up out of the seat we shared and helped him up. If he’d dropped his ice cream, you would have abandoned me and offered to buy him another. If he’d cried, you would have hugged him tight. That little boy took you away from me, into another world.’
‘I think you’re over-analysing.’
‘No. I felt it. Your connection with the boy. It was real. I never wanted children. I mean, I never actively craved them. I didn’t feel that a piece of my life was missing. When friends were pregnant or had young children crawling around, I was pleased for them, but I never felt it was something I wanted for me. But I wasn’t totally against the idea. If Martin had been keen, I suspect I would have conformed, performed – whatever and I think I might have liked it, being a mother, or at least some aspects of it. Not the baby stuff, maybe the things which come later on. It’s far too late for me now, but it isn’t for you. You could find someone younger and still have a child, someone with whom you could build models and fly kites and stamp in puddles. A mini you. Two mini yous. Five mini yous. Someone who’ll be left here when you’re gone.’
Greg stood up, turned towards Judith and leaned back against the table. ‘Wow,’ he said. ‘You left me because I smiled at a boy in a park. And I thought it was my snoring.’
‘I’m being serious. I wish you would be.’
‘I am. I am trying to be. Judith, I love you. I love everything about you. I love the way you look and smell and taste. I love the way you dress, except for that purple scarf you sometimes wear. I love the way you tell a story. I love the way you think you know everything and when you realise you don’t, you still pretend that you do. I love the way you judge other people fast and furious, but then you’re always willing to reconsider, like tonight. Other people don’t see that side of you; they don’t always stick around for long enough. I like kids. But the kids I like are other people’s kids. I’m a good uncle. I’m not sure I’d be such a great father. I have so many other things I like to do with my time.’
Judith sipped at her wine.
‘Look, in some ways people who have kids are mercenary, don’t you think?’ Greg continued. ‘I mean, leaving aside the issue of the need to keep the human race going, instead of devoting their lives to serving the wider community they, selfishly, spend loads of time and energy on their offspring. Doctors could be treating more patients, but instead, they’re at home playing with their own kids or helping them with their homework. You’ve done some pretty wonderful things with your time Not just the people you’ve defended – people who could go back to their lives with their heads held high – even the ones who you advised before you did the criminal work, whose lives were better because they avoided some long dispute which would take all their money and rattle their belief in human nature. If you’d been busy with your own kids, you’d have had less time for others.’
Judith was not sure Greg meant any of this. He could so easily be saying what he knew she wanted to hear. Still, it was nice of him to go to the trouble.
‘I accept, I might have liked to have kids if Andrea hadn’t left me, or if you and I had met earlier,’ Greg continued. ‘If, if and if again. But I don’t live my life looking at what might have been. And I’m certainly not going to throw away something wonderful, something remarkable with the woman I love, on the off chance I might be able to father a child or two some day.
‘And, yes, you’re right I should have told you about the Court TV stuff. I should have told you straight after Debbie Mallard’s trial was over. But I was desperate to get you to see me again and telling you would have been fatal. Then I was so over the moon that night, when I brought the takeaway and you let me in, I couldn’t bear the thought of jeopardising something so precious. I get a lot of satisfaction from my work, from mentoring some of the kids we get through the door. That’s really enough for me. Now I need to stop talking and hear from you.’
Judith rose slowly and kissed Greg on the cheek.
‘I’m not good at talking about these things,’ she said. ‘You know that already. I…I agree with a lot of what you said. I shouldn’t push you away every time something happens that I don’t feel comfortable with. It’s just that, since Martin, I haven’t wanted to rely on anyone for anything, in case they let me down again. It’s easier to make excuses for not making a commitment – to blame it on you, or on what you might want – than to appreciate that I am the one at fault. Ah. There I can’t say anything else tonight. Don’t make me say anything more. I need to stop talking now. Shall we go to bed?’
Greg followed Judith into the bedroom, turned back the covers and fished around for his pyjamas. And even though it was hardly 7 o’clock, he settled himself down beside her, as she drifted off to sleep. In the night, she awoke. She’d dreamed that Greg had packed a giant suitcase and left. She expected to find the bed empty but there he was, lying next to her. She stretched one arm around his shoulder, her fingertips reaching for his heart.
***
Constance met Chris for dinner. He’d brought her some flowers: tightly bound pale pink peonies with fuchsia edges. His face lit up as she approached.
‘Did you win?’ he asked.
Constance sat down, took the beautiful flowers from him and placed them on the table. She’d rather not talk about anything associated with what had just happened. She would tell Chris the absolute minimum. And she couldn’t really believe he didn’t know; it was all over the News. Maybe he knew already but didn’t want to hurt her feelings. If so, why had he even mentioned it?
‘Actually, we lost,’ she said.
‘I’m sorry. You don’t look too down, though.’
‘Don’t I? Well, maybe that’s because our client was guilty.’
‘Wow.’
‘Yep. Pulled the wool over our eyes.’
‘It can’t be the first time?’
That was more than a little insensitive, even if it was true. And she was going to have to say something just to satisfy Chris’ curiosity. Maybe she shouldn’t have come out tonight, after all.
‘There’s loads of times when you can’t be sure and you do your best with what you have, you know?’ There, she had kept it general and non-committal and not revealed the personal disaster, the betrayal, the professional embarrassment she felt Nick’s guilt really was. ‘I’d like to talk about something else, if that’s OK. It’s been a long eight days.’
‘Sure. I was just interested. What would you like to talk about?’
‘What have you been doing since we last spoke?’
‘You really want to hear about the proposals to upgrade the Thames Water barrier?’
Constance sat back. She didn’t. ‘Yes, I really do,’ she said.
Chris waved to get the barman’s attention. Constance allowed her hand to brush against his, when he returned it to the table. He noticed and smiled. Then he leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek.
‘That’s nice,’ she said.
‘I thought so too,’ he replied.
But when she started reading her way through the cocktail list and she reached the Negroni, her mind wandered of its own accord to Greg’s face on that night, almost two years ago, when they’d met in Coal Drops Yard and he’d recommended she try one. He’d made her laugh over and over and only asked about Judith in passing.
And then, as she forced herself not to think about Greg, her mind flitted to the other men to whom she had been exposed over the last week or so. Mark Sumner, ruled by his passions, which, at least for the time being were heroic and worthwhile, but which, Constance sensed, could change at any moment to something less laudable and more dangerous. Nick Demetriou, demonstrating tremendous family loyalty and devotion, wracked by guilt for the events of the past – guilt which led him to kill another man. Adrian Edge, side-lined, maligned, jealous, prepared to trample all in his wake to achieve his dream. And of course Brett Ingram, whom she had only encountered through the eyes of those who knew him, but whom she could visualise now; entrepreneur, adventurer, visionary.
Then Constance thought about Chris, sitting opposite her, who was generous and kind and good-looking, who talked about artesian wells and desalination and flood defences, a man who made things with his hands and who wanted to become an engineer because of a ninety-year-old black-and-white photo he’d seen as a boy. From what she knew so far, Chris was not impetuous or threatening, and would never be inclined to take anything by force or without justification. This was, after all, Chris, who had asked for permission to love her.
And then her eyes alighted on the cocktail right at the top of the list, which she had skipped over in her haste. It certainly packed a punch and would obliterate the events of recent days in the first mouthful; a potent mix of Cognac, Calvados, fresh lemon juice and Brut Champagne.
‘I’ll have an Ambrosia,’ she announced to the hovering waiter.
Then, her choice made, she focused all her attention on Chris, who was looking at Constance as if she was the only woman in the world. And in that moment, she felt that she was.